Expert Speak India Matters
Published on May 23, 2019
The lesson of 2019: The Modi generation, which is and will be India’s most influential ever, will reshape this country
The political transformation of India under the aegis of Narendra Modi India was supposed to experience a massive economic shift thanks to its demographic dividend — through the bulge of a young, working-age population. Instead, as two successive elections have shown, the greater impact has been on national politics. In fact, it has been transformational. The last general election, in 2014, was a generational election. For those over 30, it was an election with the usual rules — some anti-incumbency, some caste politics, and so on and so forth. But for those under 30, it was structured around the personality and promise of Narendra Modi. This is why the landslide surprised so many people: not because the basic facts about how people felt were not understood, but because the sheer size of the “Modi generation”, as I described it on 16 May 2014, is hard to internalise. The main lesson of 2019 is that 2014 was no fluke: it represents the lasting political power of this generation. The Modi generation, which is and will be India’s most influential ever, will reshape this country the way that other demographic bulges — think of the US’ Baby Boomers — have done so elsewhere. Their India will be substantively different, in terms of domestic and global politics, than that which has come before. What might this India look like? First, it will be impatient. Young people are less willing to wait for national glory. In the People’s Republic of China, the rule for the country, set by Deng Xiaoping, was to “bide your time and hide your strength”. Xi Jinping’s China, where the agenda is being set to appease a generation of young single men, has abandoned Deng’s maxim. This will be even more true for India, which is after all a democracy that must respond to the most powerful voting bloc in its history. It will be impatient about economics as well. Young Indians expect a better life soon. Today they are willing to give Modi some more time to achieve it. But, in the years to come, that patience will run out. Second, it will be aggressive. India can no longer “hide its strength”. That was the lesson we must take from the political salience in this election of Balakot, of the promise by the ruling party to enter their houses and kill India’s enemies. A national machismo is the natural consequence of a bulge of young, unemployed and unemployable men. India is perhaps less able to sustain this aggressiveness than, say, China. But the times in which India would be able to absorb terrorist attacks, for example, without a major pushback have passed. Third, it will be a risk-taker. Young people have a belief in their own invincibility, and Indian policy will be forced to reflect this. Others might argue demonetisation was a foolish mistake; but what matters to many voters is that Modi took a risk, and according to them in a good cause. The Balakot air strike on Pakistan may not have achieved a fundamental strategic transformation of the India-Pakistan relationship (though some experts disagree) but it played well politically because it was not just a demonstration of strength as a nation, but an example of a tolerance to risk. In this sense, the notion of Indian leadership has become one of risk-taking; Manmohan Singh was pilloried for caution and “silence”, Modi is considered an epochal leader because he takes risks. Fourth, it will be majoritarian. I do not mean it will be the simple, vanilla Hindutva 1.0 of the past BJP or of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. I mean that, among a large part of the Modi generation, a more unitary identity is being forged — thanks in part to social media. In the meme war that determines so many democratic elections across the world today, one fact is forgotten: most young Indians, at least, are being influenced by the same memes. Young Dalits, young upper-castes, young Himachalis and young Maharashtrians are all being drawn together by the power of what, a decade ago, was called Internet Hindutva. If Tamil Nadu is strangely resistant to this allure it may be because, at least for now, the meme economy in that state is independent of the rest of the country — and, also, remarkably strong. Fifth, it will be forgetful. Young people have little memory of the past. They will not recall the India prior to 1991, a country of dreary and unsuccessful socialism and near-arbitrary one-party rule. They therefore do not have the same fears and instincts as those who are older than them. They might well be willing to see more state control — of politics, of economics, of people’s personal lives. Just because they are younger, it does not mean that they will be more liberal. When Modi decimates the institutions of liberal India, it is not a coincidence. It is not a mere power-grab. It is a reflection of the instincts of his core youth vote: of disdain for anything that comes in the way of decision-making, of centralised power, of their will expressed through the prime minister. The BJP of Vajpayee, a party in Opposition for much of its existence, knew the dangers of one-party rule. It preserved the institutions that protected political minorities. The BJP of Modi and his young voters will not. This political transformation, driven along these axes by the Modi generation, will impact India and the world substantially. When this generation is done with it, the Republic will be unrecognisable.
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Author

Mihir Swarup Sharma

Mihir Swarup Sharma

Mihir Swarup Sharma is the Director Centre for Economy and Growth Programme at the Observer Research Foundation. He was trained as an economist and political scientist ...

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